What Are We Reading 10 May 2021

[Georg]

scarletnoir wrote: "Shelflife_wasBooklooker wrote: "
Peter Carey's Theft: A Love Story proved an enjoyable read to me, as I wrote last week, less than 4..."

Carey has a special place in my reading history: the only author who got three chances (as opposed to max two). The reviews were always so tempting. I didn't finish one of them (Illywhacker, Oscar and Lucinda, Kelly Gang).

Largely agree with your sentiments re Booker winners

[AB76]

Georg wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "Shelflife_wasBooklooker wrote: "
Peter Carey's Theft: A Love Story proved an enjoyable read to me, as I wrote la..."

i never enjoyed Carey either, all books of his i read were dumped quickly and drained my spirit on the commute, a lot like the equally dreadful Ian McEwan (when we used to commute...lol)

[giveusaclue]

AB76 wrote: "Having been on GR since we all moved here, i dont find its a competition.....

Read and discuss:

https://www.theguardian.com/books/boo......"


How strange, I guess some folks will make a competition of anything! I only put a "target" at 50 books here because I have never kept count in the past and this was an easy way of doing it. I've got to 62% of this "target" already so I guess I will easily achieve it, but I'm not going to up it for next year.

As people on here will know, who ever feel inclined to read my posts, I don't read as much "heavy" literature as some (apart from some histories) but it is always for enjoyment and curiosity. Each to their own I guess, no right or wrong.

I also think it helps that we are a pretty friendly bunch on here and not competitive with one another.

[scarletnoir]

AB76 wrote: "I recommend A Sentimental Education was on my list for 15 years and finally read it a few years ago. Not perfect but it made me think and was a rewarding read."

Thanks.

[[deleted user]]

Just to say that, behind the curve as always, I have just finished Colum McCann's "Apeirogon".
I loved it and can honestly say that I have never read a book like it.

As a break I have picked up Peaks and Bandits by Alf Bonnevie Bryn.
Only a few chapters into this very short book but it's great. In 1909 a young Norwegian climber goes to Corsica to get a bit of climbing experience. His companion is George Finch who would go on to be part of the 1922 Everest expedition.
They've not arrived in Corsica yet but have already got into a fight in Genoa, trying to pass counterfeit coins in games of billiards. They have the counterfeit coins because they are convinced that they will be swindled at some point and are practising "anticipatory retaliation".
I have no interest or in or experience of climbing but the book was sent to me as part of an outdoors type book club subscription so I thought I'd give it a whirl.

[Bill]

Georg wrote: "Bill wrote: "Have you read Reflections of an Unpolitical Man?"

I haven’t read much Thomas Mann – only some essays and then Death in Venice and Doctor Faustus: The Life Of The German Composer Adrian Leverkuhn As Told By A Friend fairly recently – and I’m not sure I will read any more fiction; I have a copy of Tonio Kröger. Occasionally a critic will make The Magic Mountain sound interesting – but I understand that there’s a long section in French left untranslated in the Lowe-Porter version (which I’d avoid at any rate); I’d need to know whether this is translated in the Woods version before undertaking it.

I’d first heard of Reflections of a Nonpolitical Man when I encountered an excerpt in Pro and Contra Wagner. Later, reading Not I: Memoirs of a German Childhood I learned that the book was the prime reason Joachim Fest’s father refused to allow his son to read Mann. I believe that the new NYRB edition is the first complete English translation, and I am likely to read it at some point.

[Lljones]

Pomfretian wrote: "Just to say that, behind the curve as always, I have just finished Colum McCann's "Apeirogon".
I loved it and can honestly say that I have never read a book like it. ..."

Given current events in Israel, I can't get this book out of my mind.

[AB76]

Bill wrote: "Georg wrote: "Bill wrote: "Have you read Reflections of an Unpolitical Man?"

I haven’t read much Thomas Mann – only some essays and then Death in Venice and [book:Doctor Faustus: The ..."

i just read Lilla's essay in the NYRB on the "Reflections". I was always suprised by Mann's stance in 1914, i found a collection of essays written by patiotic germans in 1914, which included Mann and it made me wonder how the great writer had stooped so low. I will look foward to reading the NYRB edition

[[deleted user]]

Lljones wrote: "Pomfretian wrote: "Just to say that, behind the curve as always, I have just finished Colum McCann's "Apeirogon".
I loved it and can honestly say that I have never read a book like it. ..."

Given ..."

Yes, I thought about the peace organisations whilst watching the news last night. And about the sticker on Rami's bike ...

[AB76]

giveusaclue wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Having been on GR since we all moved here, i dont find its a competition.....

Read and discuss:

https://www.theguardian.com/books/boo......"

any idea of competition in reading is alien to me, its all about enjoyment and also thinking, exploring new places, cultures and situations in the mind. I would never feel that having read 70 books in a year "beats" anyone else.

i am interested in the rate at which people read as i tend to space my reading out and am loathe to blitz a book i enjoy, prefer to let it slowly develop. Lockdown has meant i can more accurately work out the reading time i take, with little distractions, its about 12 sittings for a 300 page book. In normal times it would be longer as i would be doing a lot more. having said that, am not sure i read a lot more from March 2020 to March 2021!

[Greenfairy]

Why I am deleting Goodreads and maybe you should, too
Get on the comments before they close and demand the return of TLS !

[Greenfairy]

That was supposed to provide a link to the article in today's Graun.
More gremlins. :((

[MK]

Greenfairy wrote: "Why I am deleting Goodreads and maybe you should, too
Get on the comments before they close and demand the return of TLS !"

I did my bit - here's the link (I hope) - https://www.theguardian.com/books/boo...

[Greenfairy]

MK wrote: "Greenfairy wrote: "Why I am deleting Goodreads and maybe you should, too
Get on the comments before they close and demand the return of TLS !"

I did my bit - here's the link (I hope) - https://www..."
Yes that's the one, - and well done☺

[giveusaclue]

Greenfairy wrote: "MK wrote: "Greenfairy wrote: "Why I am deleting Goodreads and maybe you should, too
Get on the comments before they close and demand the return of TLS !"

I did my bit - here's the link (I hope) - ..."

And my two pennorth:

Maybe if the Guardian hadn't closed down the very well patronised TLS many of us wouldn't have felt the need to patronise Goodreads/Amazon!

And I mentioned on another post that the lack of moderation here was a big plus. 😃

[Slawkenbergius]

Bill wrote: "I understand that there’s a long section in French left untranslated in the Lowe-Porter version (which I’d avoid at any rate); I’d need to know whether this is translated in the Woods version before undertaking it."

It's in the 'Walpurgis Night' chapter. I have the Woods edition in front of me right now. That part is indeed in English (the lines translated from the original French are in italic).

[AB76]

I have now finished Hermann Bahr and it was an excellent read, with a long and very well put together set of footnotes and an afterword. James Conway, the man behind Rixdorf Editions did the translation and afterword.

I recommend checking out their website:

https://www.rixdorfeditions.com/

There is a small selection but worth exploring...

[AB76]

All change-ish on my reading

I still am enjoying Father and Son (Gosse) and Mothers and Daughters (Rudan)

The new books are:

The Member by John Galt (1832)

One of two satirical novels exploring the last years of un-reformed parliaments in Britain before the Reform Act of 1832. Rotten boroughs and the purchase of seats by arcane routes are central to the novel
Its well written and peppered with Scots slang, with a wry eye on the absurdities of the situation in the country in the late 1820s. (famously The Duke of Wellington, PM at the time, could not for the life of him see why he old "unreformed" parliament needed reform, he was soon on his way,k only to return a few years later)

The Last Enemy by Richard Hillary (1942)

This is an unexpected choice, it popped up as an amazon recommendation, in a handsome edition commemorating 100 years of the RAF
Hillary was an Australian RAF pilot in WW2, who wrote an account of his war, shortly before being killed in a training accident. I read "Spitfire"(by Brian Lane)ast year which was another contemporary account of WW2 where the author perished a few months later.

[Bill]

Slawkenbergius wrote: "It's in the 'Walpurgis Night' chapter. I have the Woods edition in front of me right now. That part is indeed in English (the lines translated from the original French are in italic)."

Thanks, Captain - I'll put the Woods version on my TBR.

[Georg]

Bill wrote: "Georg wrote: "Bill wrote: "Have you read Reflections of an Unpolitical Man?"

I haven’t read much Thomas Mann – only some essays and then Death in Venice and [book:Doctor Faustus: The ..."

You've read more Thomas Mann than I have. I've tried Death in Venice and Buddenbrooks several times and couldn't finish either. He was quite miffed that he got the Nobel Prize for Buddenbrooks only btw, no mention of The Magic Mountain.
I've only read quotes/reviews of Reflexions.... Which I found...lets put it politely...quite unpleasant to read. Not only for the content, but also for the language.

Thanks for the Fest anecdote. You must be one of the 137 Americans who know that name.

[Georg]

AB76 wrote: "I have now finished Hermann Bahr and it was an excellent read, with a long and very well put together set of footnotes and an afterword. James Conway, the man behind Rixdorf Editions did the transl..."

Oh, that was quick.... What did you think about the Séverine chapter?

[AB76]

Georg wrote: "AB76 wrote: "I have now finished Hermann Bahr and it was an excellent read, with a long and very well put together set of footnotes and an afterword. James Conway, the man behind Rixdorf Editions d..."

hi georg
embarrassing that such a major figure of womens movements and such a character should have been portrayed as some kind of lost kitten,parroting phrases. It was the only interview that jarred on me , Bahr treated her like a silly little girl, when she was about 8 years older than him

i dont expect much from portrayals of women in this period but i was dissapointed. If Bahr had been an average writer who i disliked it would have been par for the course but instead you have one of a few female interviewees being treated as a kind of twittering robin in a garden. (i feel i should defend her...not as a woman but as a fellow redhead, what brilliant hair she had, bright red...not sure if it was maybe dyed)

the interviews covered 170 pages, with another 30-40 in footnotes and the afterword. I suspect your german edition was a lot more prolix, from your review of Bahr's style

Apparently his inspiration was a work by a french journalist called Huret who interviewed the many leading authors of the 1880s and published it as a book

[Robert]

Lljones wrote: "

I've been enjoying some big skies in Seattle lately. This photo is from Jefferson Park on Beacon Hill, site of my daily '10,000 steps' walk.

Rebecca to Rachel: 10 of the best Daphne du Maurier f..."

Appreciate the Seattle pictures. Here in the wilds of Auburn the best views are of power lines.

[Tam]

AB76 wrote: "Georg wrote: "AB76 wrote: "I have now finished Hermann Bahr and it was an excellent read, with a long and very well put together set of footnotes and an afterword. James Conway, the man behind Rixd..."

Does Séverine have a second name? in trying to research it I get a whole load of much more recent severines!...

[AB76]

Tam wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Georg wrote: "AB76 wrote: "I have now finished Hermann Bahr and it was an excellent read, with a long and very well put together set of footnotes and an afterword. James Conway, the ma..."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carolin...

[FranHunny]

I just managed to read another Pratchett short story collection, the time travelling caveman. This one did not manage to excite me as much. The story endings aren't the best written endings and Sir Terry's humor has not yet developed its depth.

[SydneyH]

Does anyone have any favourite novels set in India?

[Robert]

Midnight's Children is good.

[SydneyH]

Robert wrote: "Midnight's Children is good."

I agree. That's one of the few that I've read, I'm hoping to unearth a few more.

[CCCubbon]

SydneyH wrote: "Robert wrote: "Midnight's Children is good."

I agree. That's one of the few that I've read, I'm hoping to unearth a few more."

There is a series set in Calcutta just after WW1 by Abir Mukherjee that begins with A Rising Man that I enjoyed reading and learned much about life then.

[Georg]

SydneyH wrote: "Does anyone have any favourite novels set in India?"


1. A Fine Balance
2. Family Matters
3. Such a Long Journey

by Rohinton Mistry

4. A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth

[Shelflife_wasBooklooker]

SydneyH wrote #77: "Does anyone have any favourite novels set in India?"

July 17, 2008—Mumbai

Midnight was closing in, the one-legged woman was grievously burned, and the Mumbai police were coming for Abdul and his father. In a slum hut by the international airport, Abdul’s parents came to a decision with an uncharacteristic economy of words. The father, a sick man, would wait inside the trash-strewn, tin-roofed shack where the family of eleven resided. He’d go quietly when arrested. Abdul, the household earner, was the one who had to flee.

Abdul’s opinion of this plan had not been solicited, typically. Already he was mule-brained with panic. He was sixteen years old, or maybe nineteen—his parents were hopeless with dates. Allah, in His impenetrable wisdom, had cut him small and jumpy. A coward: Abdul said it of himself. He knew nothing about eluding policemen. What he knew about, mainly, was trash. For nearly all the waking hours of nearly all the years he could remember, he’d been buying and selling to recyclers the things that richer people threw away.

This is the start to Katherine Boo's Behind the Beautiful Forevers: Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity,
one of the books that impressed me most in the last years, and which delighted other TL&S readers as well: https://www.theguardian.com/books/boo...
(read threaded)

Don't be deterred by the title (whose first part I thought great once I understood where it was coming from) or, as I just saw here on GR, strange cover designs. (Mine, not on offer here, is this Portobello one: https://thebailliegiffordprize.co.uk/..., and I think it's o.k.)


SydneyH wrote #46: "Gustave Flaubert's Salammbô ...

Oh man, it gets so much better. I remember being a bit disturbed early on when soldiers throw the sacred fish in boiling water. To me it felt like an exercise in sadism. But what stands out to me are the later battle scenes. I don't want to say more, but make sure you finish it."

Thanks, Sydney, that's good to know. Almost a third in now. Yes, I had the same response regarding the fish, and not least about the massacring of humans...
It makes sense within the framework of the novel though, so far.

Maybe more on that later, as on Carey and Co. Reliably not too cold weather, at last, and just about to carry most of the potted plants out on the terrace where they are meant to stay for the annual "ersatz (...) jungle" until it gets too cold again.

[AB76]

SydneyH wrote: "Does anyone have any favourite novels set in India?"

Train to Pakistan by Khushwant Singh (1940s)
Twilight In Dehli by Ahmed Ali (1940s)
Passage To India by EM Forster (1920s)
Bengal Nights by Mircea Eliade

None are contempary, not a fan of modern indian fiction at all (it gets a lot of undeserved hype)
These classics all study india from different angles and different regions
Sikh, Muslim and European views of the nation,locations from Amritsar, to Delhi to Bengal

[AB76]

Just ordered a gaelic novel in translation from Parthian books website, written in 1986.



I feel its always best to try and order books that are newly issued before they become scarce or sink without a trace. i learnt this the hard way, i would find a novel and think "i'll buy this in a few months" and a few months later...its gone

[Gpfr]

AB76 wrote: "SydneyH wrote: "Does anyone have any favourite novels set in India?"
"not a fan of modern indian fiction at all (it gets a lot of undeserved hype) ..."

I agree with Georg that Rohinton Mistry is excellent. I also like Vikram Seth.

[Andy]

No phone signal or internet this week until now, so plenty of reading, alas not all good.
Highlights White Shadow by Roy Jacobsen, and, thanks to AB, The Vampire of Ropraz by Jacques Chessex. This guy is right up my street AB, loved it, and looking forward to more.
Reviews to follow, just catching up on myself...

[Andy]

Georg wrote: "SydneyH wrote: "Does anyone have any favourite novels set in India?"


1. A Fine Balance
2. Family Matters
3. Such a Long Journey

by Rohinton Mistry

4. A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth"

If you’re at all interested in cricket try Selection Day.

[AB76]

Andy wrote: "No phone signal or internet this week until now, so plenty of reading, alas not all good.
Highlights White Shadow by Roy Jacobsen, and, thanks to AB, [book:The Vamp..."

good to hear you enjoyed Chessex, i think that mountain swiss writing will always be up your street. "mountain noir" i call it...Ramuz was an influence on Chessex i'm sure

[AB76]

anyone seen leathercol anywhere?

I miss the big fella and his posts, there is a book on the Rixdorf Editions website about LGBT Berlin that would interest him...

https://www.rixdorfeditions.com/hirsc...

[SydneyH]

Thanks everyone for your India recommendations. I thought I might resume my project of tracking down novels set in jungles, and it occurred to me that Indian literature is a bit of a weak point for me. A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry is on my radar, I've delayed reading it until now because of the length, but I think I'll finally take the plunge. I've also noted The Guide by R.K. Narayan, which Harold Bloom listed in his account of the canon. My one contribution to the discussion is The Association of Small Bombs by Karan Mahajan, which has been one of my picks of recent years - I think Mahajan writes some dazzling prose.

[Robert]

CCCubbon wrote: "SydneyH wrote: "Robert wrote: "Midnight's Children is good."

I agree. That's one of the few that I've read, I'm hoping to unearth a few more."

There is a series set in Calcutta just after WW1 by ..."

White Tiger is good, too.

[scarletnoir]

SydneyH wrote: "Thanks everyone for your India recommendations. I thought I might resume my project of tracking down novels set in jungles, and it occurred to me that Indian literature is a bit of a weak point for..."

I'm not sure how he is regarded in our politically correct times, but Norman Mailer's debut novel The Naked and the Dead
impressed me a great deal when I was a young man... set in the Philippines during WW2, it definitely has some jungle passages...

In that regard, I'm not quite sure if you wanted 'Indian' books to also be 'jungle' books - from seeing the TV adaptation of 'A Suitable Boy', it seems to me that the action took place mainly in drawing rooms, and not at all in jungles (but it must have been severely edited). If you are simply interested in India-set books, I'd second CCC's recommendation of Abir Mukherjee's mainly Calcutta-based series of crime novels, which make a point of introducing some key incidents from Indian history from 1919 onwards.

[SydneyH]

scarletnoir wrote: "not quite sure if you wanted 'Indian' books to also be 'jungle' books."

No, they don't have to be jungle books, I was just following an obscure chain of associations. I have an ongoing project of looking for books set in tropical places, whether those be jungles, islands, etcetera.

[AB76]

SydneyH wrote: "Thanks everyone for your India recommendations. I thought I might resume my project of tracking down novels set in jungles, and it occurred to me that Indian literature is a bit of a weak point for..."

RK Narayan is worth exploring and Raja Rao too, again both not part of the modern Indian literature canon

[AB76]

The excellent Flashbak photo sight has some great images of Stoke Newington in 1978-79

https://flashbak.com/stoke-newington-...

....the days before Thatcherism took hold

[AB76]

This fortnights LRB has been full of interesting articles, its generally a very good read but can have mediocre editions sometimes

Amid so many good topics, one article was a revelation to me about Patrick O'Brian the author of the Aubtey-Maturin novels. This arch-Irish supposed Catholic author turns out to have been 100% non-Irish, actually of German descent with the surname "Russ" and a lifelong fantasist, while also being a brilliant writer

Deception like this is a fascinating thing, the reviewer wonders why O'Brian played himself as a catholic irishman and his other flights of fantasy.....

The article was reviewing Nikolai Tolstoys book about O'Brian

[AB76]

Popped into my local Oxfam bookshop and picked up two books:

Washington Sq by Henry James
Police by Ben Whttaker (non-fiction)

Nice to find some interesting titles, there were a shelf of 1920s potboilers with a yellow band below the illustration,by Horwitz. I should have picked a few up but was unsure about their quality. (just googled it, Horvitz was an australian publisher of pulp fiction)

I made sure with some russian 1980s studies from a russian publisher(Glas), when they popped up,that i purchased quite a few in 2018

[Tam]

AB76 wrote: "This fortnights LRB has been full of interesting articles, its generally a very good read but can have mediocre editions sometimes

Amid so many good topics, one article was a revelation to me abou..."

His mother was Irish, and she died when he was four, so not surprising that he wanted to reclaim a bit of himself perhaps, especially as he does not seem to have had much of a happy childhood...

[AB76]

Tam wrote: "AB76 wrote: "This fortnights LRB has been full of interesting articles, its generally a very good read but can have mediocre editions sometimes

Amid so many good topics, one article was a revelati..."

yes, i suppose he latched onto the heritage and it gave him strength/identity, the article didnt mention his mothers heritage as far as i can remember

[AB76]

Goethe Instutiut have a fantastic range of Jewish data and information from the Imperial German period, see link below:

http://sammlungen.ub.uni-frankfurt.de...

I downloaded a PDF containing 277 pages of the"Zeitschrift fur demographie und statistik der juden" from 1912. Its all in German but i am making steady, though good progress, through various studies of Jewish populations around the world within this PDF